Amnesia: Memories

Score: 8.0
Ages: 13+
2013/2015

Amnesia: Memories is yet another visual novel with amnesia theme. It seems almost silly to say it, but once more there is a good game behind that cliché. This is an otome game and if one is completely turned off by sweet nothings whispered to your ear by androgynous bishounen with soft voices, this game probably isn’t for them. The story also has some serious darker tones which sometimes strongly contradict all the fluffy romance stuff.

[Spoilers] SoulSet

The cynic.

I wanted to talk a bit more about SoulSet but I’ve decided to keep my reviews spoiler free, so here’s another post that tells a lot more about the characters and plot. With the plot of this game it’s quite impossible to stay vague about certain reveals, so heavy spoilers ahead.

Shardlight

Post-apocalypse

Score: 8.0
Ages: 12+
2016

Shardlight might not be Wadjet Eye’s brightest star but it is another solid point & click adventure. The game is set on a post-apocalyptic world so it’s rather bleak and violent, and filled with dark humour.

Shadowrun Returns

The neighbourhood is very cyberpunk.

Score: 8.0
Ages: 15+
2013

Shadowrun was one of the gaps in my gaming knowledge. The return created a lot of buzz and surely I was interested in checking out this cyberpunk/fantasy game, especially since it’s a turn based RPG.

Tormentum – Dark Sorrow

Score: 8.0
2015

Tormentum: Dark Sorrow is a puzzle heavy adventure with very traditional gameplay and incredibly beautiful art style. Every screen is a piece of art. The journey through this dark fantasy is definitely worth playing.

Penny Dreadful – Season One

Score: 9.0
(17+)
2014

Penny Dreadful already finished its second season last summer but I’ve only seen the first. I’m terribly behind in most of the TV series but I’ll try to put a word or two for some of the better shows anyway. This show is wonderfully bleak and gritty compared to the many beautiful, almost fairy tale like stories out there. There’s sex and blood and death.

Kickstarting Psychological Horror

Once again there are several promising games looking to be funded through Kickstarter. I checked some of them out and will give a few short recommendations here. These titles are united by a dark horror themes and are meant for mature players. They are being done by people that aren’t native English speakers so the language might not be perfect in all places, but I consider the artistic vision and atmosphere more important anyway.

Movies From The 90s – 1999

The last year. Sorry about being lazier the further I got with the decade. But aren’t we going out with a bang? So much good stuff that I just want to weep. Fight Club and The Matrix are in the IMDb top20. Sixth Sense, The Green Mile and American Beauty a bit further down. Even skipping all these, I have a lot of issues limiting things down to 5. And I shouldn’t skip them really, they’re all great psychological movies, albeit from very different angles.

Movies From The 90s – 1998

Nearing the end… First I thought I’d only have a couple of movies for this year but looking into it a bit more I didn’t end up having hard time at all finding five (and more) suitable films for the year.

I won’t bring the boring categories back, but there’s at least Johnny Depp! I don’t remember enough about these movies, I’ve only watched Dark City in the recent years, but they were awesome back then, so I still believe them to be awesome today – and will eventually confirm this by watching them again. The movies are arranged according to their current IMDb popularity.

The Cat Lady

Score: 10
(18+)
2012

I used to be a much bigger horror enthusiast when I was younger. In the last decade or so I had turned into a scaredy-cat really. The pop culture representing horror mostly with unnecessary gore and jump scares and the horrible overuse of zombies just made me less drawn to the genre. But recently I’ve found horror again with the help of some surreal and aesthetically interesting experiences, focusing on the psychological dread rather than running away from axe-murderers. And I find things like the TV show Hannibal and this indie game something very artistic and beautiful even in their more grotesque parts.